Component report pins MacBook overhaul for third quarter

The next update to Apple Inc.'s line of 13-inch MacBook consumer portables will arrive sometime during the third quarter of the year, Far Eastern component suppliers are reported to have revealed.

Without citing sources, the Chinese-language Commercial Times said Friday that Taiwan's AU Optronics and Chi Mei Optoelectronics will evenly split the LCD panel orders for the new notebooks, which will see a launch somewhere in the July to September timeframe.

These new MacBook, as AppleInsiderexclusively reported last month, will see their first structural and aesthetic changes since being introduced as an Intel-based replacement for Apple's iBook line over two years ago.

More specifically, people familiar with the matter have said the notebooks will shed their plastic enclosures for ones constructed from more eco-friendly materials such as aircraft-grade aluminum and stainless steel.

When they arrive later this year, alongside similarly overhauled MacBook Pros, the notebooks should more closely resemble the overall appearance of Apple's aluminum iMacs and the MacBook Air, those same people have said.

The report by the Commercial Times offers the same timeframe for the new notebooks originally reported by AppleInsider, which is slightly later than the June timeframe reported by another technology publication.

Both the MacBook and MacBook Pro are expected to receive "Montevina"-based processors from the Intel's upcoming Centrino 2 platform, which require a new "Socket B" logic-board. The second-gen mobile Penryn chips boast a 1066MHz front-side bus and clock between 2.26GHz and 2.8GHz.

One of these days, the necessary size for the MacPro tower might be reduced, but Apple will not split it's product line- they've spend the last 10 years defining it. You either need the storage and card slots that a MacPro tower affords for pro Apps... or you don't and you buy a iMac or MacMini.

I don't see this happening any time in the next several years. The average consumer still uses an optical drive too often (or at least thinks he would need it too often...probably some of both) for Apple to cut it out. Why release the Macbook Air if you're going to take the drive out of the Macbook in a year?

Now, long-term I agree that the optical drive will be phased out as broadband becomes ubiquitous and much faster, which will lead to much smaller and lighter notebooks...but that's going to take awhile.

I think the tide may shift when Apple offers all their software, except maybe their pro apps, by download. If the only way to get it is on a disc, then dropping the optical from any existing product is premature. They need to push the studios to allow a lot more of their movies online too, at least for rent. The titles available for legal downloads only being offered in numbers that amount to 1% of the available DVD catalogs just doesn't bode well.

I like the Air, but that pesky optical drive is still too useful for me to drop or accept as a separate device.

The 15 inch aluminum Powerbook G4 and 15 inch MacBook Pro seem to get a lot of dents around the DVD slot. I see customers bringing these in all the time for busted DVD slots. Repairing this type of damage requires totally disassembling the entire laptop, removing every single component, and replacing the entire bottom part of the laptop. This process is both time consuming for the technician and expensive for the customer. Even under normal usage, the DVD slot tends to deform. If Apple made the laptop with a fully open front for the DVD drive, then all that would be needed is to slide out the old drive and slide in a new one, instead of all the unnecessary hassle that one has to deal with today.

I could see them rolling out the wireless optical drive software solution that they introduced with the MacBook Air (that is, ship a laptop with no optical drive to shave off weight + cost, and then offer the optical drive as an external option for those who want it).

This would further differentiate the MacBook line from the MacBook Pro line, as well as fit in with Apple's digital media strategy (they'd like everyone to buy stuff from the Apple Store). After all, the cost/benefit equation for the optical drive in a laptop for non-power users has shifted in the last few years. Most activity is online now (including software installation/updates), media can be consumed wirelessly, and portability is paramount. For most other cases, an external drive is a viable solution, or the shared drive software that they developed for the Air.

If you disagreed with any of the above and think that an optical drive is essential, look at it from Apple's perspective: you're a MacBook Pro customer! (And you just got a better graphics card!)

Dropping the optical drive on the MacBook would enable them to make the enclosure substantially smaller/lighter/stronger/cheaper, it's an all around win situation. Come to think of it, the Air fits the product matrix in place of the regular MacBook. All they need is a 13" MacBook Pro.